CAMPBELL, RICHARD T.
HENRETTA, JOHN C.
Status Claims and Status Attainment: The Determinants of Financial Well-Being
American Journal of Sociology 86,3 (November 1980): 618-629
Cohort(s): Older Men
ID Number: 352
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

This paper examines the dimensionality of status measures related to net worth and occupation. The measures of status considered include: home equity, savings, real estate assets, business assets, earnings, and pension coverage. The authors consider the role of each in status evaluations and examine empirically whether the process of attainment of each is the same. This hypothesis is rejected and a final model presented that allows a different process of attainment for each measure. It was found that, net of earnings, family formation measures have large effects on the different status measures consistent with different patterns of family needs. Finally, the implications of using wealth and consumption measures as measures of status are discussed.

GOLDSCHEIDER, FRANCES K.
WAITE, LINDA J.
Sex Differences in the Entry into Marriage
American Journal of Sociology 92,1 (July 1986): 91-109
Cohort(s): Young Men, Young Women
ID Number: 792
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Among the many transitions young people make as they enter adulthood, marriage is perhaps the most important. This paper uses data from the NLS of Young Women and Young Men to examine the transition to marriage and how it differs by sex, testing the extent of variation in the desirability of marriage for men and women, and the effects of marriage market factors and marital and nonmarital roles. The design of the analysis allows the effects of these factors to vary over the young adult years. The pattern of findings suggests that recent declines in the marriage rate have not resulted from increased barriers to marriage but from declines in relative preferences for marriage.

HAO, LINGXIN
BRINTON, MARY C.
Productive Activities and Support Systems of Single Mothers
American Journal of Sociology 102,5 (March 1997): 1305-1344
Cohort(s): NLSY79
ID Number: 2885
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Young single mothers' human capital development and labor market participation are important issues of public policy concern in the United States. This article uses a dynamic approach to model the determinants of single mothers' entry into and exit from productive activities. Using 14 waves of data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, the article shows that kin coresidence facilitates young single mothers' entry into productive activities but does not play a significant role in sustaining participation. Women's individual trainability, the local labor market conditions, child support, and d some family background factors all play a role. The results also demonstrate the insignificance of race and never-married versus ever-married status. (Copyright by the University of Chicago. All rights reserved.)

HENRETTA, JOHN C.
CAMPBELL, RICHARD T.
Net Worth as an Aspect of Status
American Journal of Sociology 83,5 (March 1978): 1204-1223
Cohort(s): Older Men
ID Number: 954
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

This article discusses the role of net worth as a component of status and estimates a status attainment model for net worth. The findings show that: (1) the effect of family background is transmitted via education; (2) the effect of education is asymptotic rather than linear; (3) single and divorced persons possess substantially fewer assets, net of other characteristics, than married persons; and (4) net of all other variables, earnings have a considerable effect on net worth.

KILBOURNE, BARBARA STANEK
FARKAS, GEORGE
BERON, KURT
WEIR, DOROTHEA
ENGLAND, PAULA A.
Returns to Skill, Compensating Differentials, and Gender Bias: Effects of Occupational Characteristics on the Wages of White Women and Men
American Journal of Sociology 100,3 (November 1994): 689-719
Cohort(s): Young Men, Young Women
ID Number: 3286
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Gender differences in the earnings of white US workers are decomposed using a regression model with fixed-effects & national individual-level panel data from the 1966-1981 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (N = approximately 10,000 respondents ages 14-24 at initial sampling). In accordance with neoclassical predictions from human capital theory, net positive returns to individuals' education & experience & to occupations' cognitive physical skills are found. While sex differences in experience have large effects on the sex gap, skill contributes little. In accordance with cultural feminist predictions, negative returns to being in an occupation with a higher % of females or requiring more nurturant social skills are found. These forms of gendered valuation contribute significantly to the sex gap in pay. In contrast to the neoclassical prediction of compensating differentials, there are no consistently positive effects for onerous physical conditions, nor do these have much effect on the gap. 2 Tables, 1 Appendix, 54 References. Adapted from the source document. (Copyright 1995, Sociological Abstracts, Inc., all rights reserved.)

MCLEOD, JANE D.
FETTES, DANIELLE L.
Trajectories of Failure: The Educational Careers of Children with Mental Health Problems
American Journal of Sociology 113,3 (November 2007): 653-701
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79
ID Number: 5690
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

The authors draw on developmental psychopathology, life course sociology, and scholarship on educational processes to develop a conceptual framework for understanding the association of children's mental health problems with educational attainment. They use this framework to address two empirical gaps in prior research: lack of attention to mental health trajectories and the failure to consider diverse explanations. Using data from the Children of the National Longitudinal Surveys of Youth data set, the authors identify latent classes that characterize trajectories of internalizing and externalizing problems from childhood through adolescence. Youths in the classes vary significantly in their likelihoods of high school completion and college entry. The authors evaluate the ability of three sets of mediators to explain these patterns: academic aptitude, disruptive behaviors, and educational expectations. Educational expectations are important mediators independent of academic aptitude and disruptive behaviors. Social responses to youths' mental health problems contribute importantly to their disrupted educational trajectories.

PARCEL, TOBY L.
MENAGHAN, ELIZABETH G.
Early Parental Work, Family Social Capital, and Early Childhood Outcomes
American Journal of Sociology 99, 4 (January 1994): 972-1009
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
ID Number: 1823
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Uses data from the 1986 wave of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to evaluate the impact of parental working conditions on both a cognitive & a social child outcome among a national sample of employed mothers with children ages 3-6. Results indicate that current maternal working conditions affect children's verbal facility, but paternal work hours in the early years have significant effects on children's behavior problems. Mothers' current occupational complexity interacts with her resources & employment characteristics to influence both cognitive & social outcomes. It is concluded that adequate parental resources contribute to the forms of family social capital useful in facilitating positive child outcomes, but that findings of negative effects of maternal work in the child's first year have been overgeneralized. 5 Tables, 1 Figure, 1 Appendix, 70 References. Adapted from the source document. (Copyright 1994, Sociological Abstracts, Inc., all rights reserved.)

SUTER, LARRY E.
MILLER, HERMAN P.
Income Differences Between Men and Career Women
American Journal of Sociology 78,4 (January 1973): 962-974
Cohort(s): Mature Women
ID Number: 2345
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

The analysis of incomes for men and women 30-44 years old in 1967 presented in this paper shows that by considering only educational level, occupational status, and work experience, the income level for women can be predicted more confidently than for men. Women's pay is commensurate with effort and education, but incomes tend to cluster around the average rather than varying widely around the regression line. The absence of marked variation means that most women were receiving "just average" wages, regardless of training, job status, or experience. The income distribution of men, on the other hand, tends to be skewed toward higher income levels.

TOMASKOVIC-DEVEY, DONALD
THOMAS, MELVIN
JOHNSON, KECIA RENEE
Race and the Accumulation of Human Capital across the Career: A Theoretical Model and Fixed-Effects Application
American Journal of Sociology 111,1 (July 2005): 58-89. Also: http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/AJS/journal/issues/v111n1/080186/080186.html
Cohort(s): NLSY79
ID Number: 5114
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

The authors develop an explicitly sociological variant on human capital theory, emphasizing that most human capital acquisition is a social product, not an individual investment decision. The authors apply this model to racial earnings inequality, focusing on how exposure to discrimination influences both human capital acquisition and earnings inequalities as they develop across the career. The authors estimate models of career earnings trajectories, which show flatter trajectories for black and Hispanic men relative to white men, partial mediation by human capital acquired inside the labor market, and much larger race/ethnic career inequalities among the highly educated.

WAITE, LINDA J.
Working Wives and the Life Cycle
American Journal of Sociology 86,2 (September 1980): 272-294
Cohort(s): Young Women
ID Number: 2444
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

The concept of the "family life cycle" provides a valuable context within which to study labor force participation of married women. This article tests the hypothesis that the process by which wives make the decision to supply labor to the market varies with position in that life cycle. An examination is made of market activity during the early stages of the cycle, from marriage through the completion of childbearing. The effects of the most important determinants of married women's labor force involvement are found to depend on life-cycle stage. Wives who consider their families complete tend to be more responsible to family financial circumstances and the characteristics of the labor market in which they live than do childless women or mothers who expect more children. History of employment is found to be most important in predicting current market activity for mothers who expect more children and least important for those who do not.

WAITE, LINDA J.
BERRYMAN, SUE E.
Job Stability Among Young Women: A Comparison of Traditional and Nontraditional Occupations
American Journal of Sociology 92,3 (November 1986): 568-595
Cohort(s): NLSY79
ID Number: 2445
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

This paper explores young women's retention in sex-atypical jobs in the military and in civilian firms. It develops hypotheses about the effects on one-year turnover of sex composition of the occupation in the national labor force. These hypotheses were drawn from several theoretical perspectives on career mobility and the effects of outgroup membership on acceptance. Tests of these hypotheses, using data from the NLSY, provide no evidence that being in a nontraditional occupation increases the chances that a young woman will leave her current employer. The military sector shows a more complex relationship between occupational typicality and women's exit from the services.

WESTERN, BRUCE
BECKETT, KATHERINE
How Unregulated is the U.S. Labor Market? The Penal System as a Labor Market Institution
American Journal of Sociology 104,4 (January 1999): 1030-1060
Cohort(s): NLSY79
ID Number: 3382
Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Comparative research contrasts the corporatist welfare states of Europe with the unregulated U.S. labor market to explain low rates of U.S. unemployment in the 1980s and 1990s. In contrast, this article argues that the U.S. state made a large and coercive intervention into the labor market through the expansion of the penal system. The impact of incarceration on unemployment has two conflicting dynamics. In the short run, U.S. incarceration lowers conventional unemployment measures by removing able-bodied, working-age men from labor force counts. In the long run, social survey data show that incarceration raises unemployment by reducing the job prospects of ex-convicts. Strong U.S. employment performance in the 1980s and 1990s has thus depended in part on a high and increasing incarceration rate.

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